Fracas between student unions and deputy director of education

Deputy director of education (Pune) Suman Shinde filed a police complaint against a youth leader of the Shiv Sena on Wednesday in a clear message to student unions that no pressure tactics and attempts to influence Class XI Centralised Admission Procedure (CAP) would be tolerated.

As a fallout of this incident all student union leaders came together in support of the Sena leader as the police have registered a cognizable offence against him after the complaint.

Taking a stand: On Wednesday, Shiv Sena youth leader Kiran Sali (in white) approached Suman Shinde with about 15 men and asked her for a written clarification on the capitation fee collected by a certain junior college. He was protesting against centralised admission procedure that student union leaders like him say has been caught in red tape

“On Wednesday, Yuva Sena leader Kiran Sali along with about 15 men approached deputy director Shinde at Abasaheb Garware College asking her to give a written clarification about the capitation fee collected by a certain junior college. When she refused, they gathered around her and start protesting. Later, Shinde registered a complaint,” said Police Inspector Manohar Joshi of the Deccan police station.

Police have registered a cognizable offence under section 353 of the IPC for creating disturbance in a government work. “We have still not initiated any action. All student union leaders have refuted the charges against Sali. So, we will arrest him only after a preliminary investigation,” said Joshi.

“The Class XI admission work is already over. So, how can she file a complaint against me under section 353. We have found many irregularities in the recently held admission process. Many students have still not got admission anywhere. We just asked her what her department was doing about it,” said Sali.

On Thursday afternoon, around 50 Karyakartas of various political outfits and unions gathered at Deccan police station insupport of Sali. According to sources, Shinde has keenly monitored the CAP process to curb malpractices and make sure students only get into colleges they deserve, and not use corrupt means via the management quota to simply get into preferred colleges.

“We have received many complaints that students have been allotted colleges that are far away from their homes. Till last year, using our authority, we were settling such cases by making negotiations with nearby colleges. But, this year in the name of strengthening the admission procedure, the education department has introduced red tape,” said another student union leader. Shinde was in Mumbai on Thursday for official work. Despite repeated attempts, she was remain unavailable for comment.

The cause of unrest At the start of the Class XI centralised admission procedure, deputy director Suman Shinde instructed all colleges to follow norms when giving out seats through the management quota, warning them that no college should admit over five per cent students under this quota. She also maintained an audit of seat allocation at all junior colleges by making sure no college is giving admission out of the CAP. Due to this, there is unrest among student unions as for the first time this year; they have hardly played any role in the admissions.